


Comfort Food

by Ren



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Kazakhstan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-13
Updated: 2018-09-13
Packaged: 2019-07-11 23:32:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15982832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ren/pseuds/Ren
Summary: "What's the problem?" Yuri asks, lifting his gaze from his phone. "Did you forget to go grocery shopping?"He flashes him a grin that Otabek is almost too distracted to return. "Don't worry, there is food in the fridge. Although I can't promise that our diets are safe." He clears his throat. "It seems my mother left us a few of her dishes."





	Comfort Food

**Author's Note:**

> Another zine piece that I wrote back in 2017 and forgot to post. This one was for the _Dark Horse_ zine and I loved the opportunity to write about my favourite Kazakh boy in his home, surrounded by his friends and family.
> 
> I owe a huge debt of gratitude to the _Dark Horse_ mods and fellow participants for helping me research Kazakh culture and cuisine. Thank you also to my beta Evy. Any remaining errors are my own.

Otabek stares at the contents of his fridge for a long moment, his fingers growing colder and colder against the cool metal of the door. Then, when he's sure that this is not a hallucination and the piles of tupperware and bowls covered by cling film will not disappear before his eyes, he slowly pushes the door closed.

"What's the problem?" Yuri asks, lifting his gaze from his phone. "Did you forget to go grocery shopping?"

Otabek shakes his head and suppresses a sigh. No, he definitely remembered to buy groceries. Not that it matters now.

"You don't need to cook," Yuri continues. "We can eat out or order takeaway or whatever. As long as you don't tell Yakov that we had pizza," he adds in a conspiratorial tone.

He flashes him a grin that Otabek is almost too distracted to return. "Don't worry, there is food in the fridge. Although I can't promise that our diets are safe." He clears his throat. "It seems my mother left us a few of her dishes."

"That sounds great, I'm starving!"

"I'll heat up something in a moment, I just need to call her first."

Yuri nods and heads back to the living room while Otabek dials his mother's number. "Say 'thank you' for me," Yuri calls over his shoulder before disappearing.

She picks up on the second ring. "Hello, Beka!"

"Hi, mum." In the background, he can hear the sounds of one of his mother's TV shows. "I saw you stopped by."

"Yes, I was just at your place but you weren't around."

"I have classes all day on Thursday and then I went to pick Yuri up at the airport."

"That's right, you told me your friend was visiting!" The noise from the TV gets fainter as his mother moves around and starts rummaging through something. "You even printed me your schedule but I can't find it any more… I thought I put it here with your sisters' dance classes…"

"It doesn't matter, I can print you another copy. Sorry you had a wasted trip."

"Oh, no, it wasn't wasted at all. I left you something to eat in the fridge. Did you find it?"

Otabek looks at the flyers and receipts covering the white steel door. "Yes, I did." It would be difficult not to. Otabek pauses as he thinks of a way to phrase this. "Thank you for the food. Although–"

“You should eat the kespe today, the noodles taste better when they're freshly made. I left you some broth too, made with a lot of meat, just how you like it."

Otabek opens the fridge again, wedging his mobile between ear and shoulder so he can search among the mountain of food. In the back he finds a pot – an entire pot! – full to the brim with broth. "Mum… It looks delicious, but it's too much for me. Even for two people…"

"Nonsense," his mother cuts in. "You're a growing boy, you need to eat."

"I eat," Otabek points out. "I'm grateful you went to the trouble to bring food, but I can cook for myself."

"Of course you can, Beka, but you're always so busy between your classes and skating practice. It's no trouble at all to put aside an extra portion for you. Especially when your friend is staying over."

Glancing at the fridge again, Otabek suspects this is more than extra portions left over from his family's meal. The shelves are full of all sorts of dishes: aside from the kespe there are a couple of bowls of borscht, half a chicken with potatoes, an entire steamed trout. The entire top shelf is taken by a small mound of plov made just how he likes it, the plate piled high with rice and beef and carrots.

An entire family could feast on his mother's cooking. "Mum, we'll never be able to finish all of this. I was going to make us some chicken salad for dinner." He thinks about the lone chicken breast and the bag of lettuce he bought yesterday, now lost somewhere in the depths of his fridge.

A sigh on the other end. "I worry that you're not eating enough, Beka, now that you're on your own."

"I was on my own in Canada too and I managed to get by."

"You were in a dormitory in Canada. It's different." His mother clucks her tongue. "What does it mean, anyway, that you 'get by'?"

"It was just a manner of speaking," Otabek says quickly, but not quick enough to stop her mother from embarking on her favourite argument.

"Every time I see you, you look thinner and thinner. You look like you're wasting away! How much weight have you lost already since the start of the year?"

Otabek bites the inside of his cheek to keep himself from laughing; it wouldn't be kind to his mother, who means well. "Mum, I haven't lost any weight, I'm fine."

"Are you sure? How do you know?"

"I'm sure, I checked just yesterday. I'm on a diet because competition season is about to start."

Another cluck of the tongue on the other end of the phone. " _Diet_. I don't like the sound of that."

"It's not that kind of diet, mum. It's to make sure I eat healthy."

"How can you be healthy if you don't eat enough," his mother huffs. "Eat the kespe, the meat is good for you."

Otabek is already trying to plan his next few meals. The uncooked chicken and vegetables can be frozen for later and he can warm some soup and two bowl of kespe instead – not all of it, since mother has given him enough for several meals.

His diet and Yuri's would be completely wrecked if they ate all of it but his mother doesn't need to know that. All he says is, "You brought enough to feed me for a month." He grins as his mother gives a mock-annoyed huff.

"Not for a month, just a couple of days, and you have a guest too! What's the point of giving you boys just enough food for one meal? You still need to eat tomorrow."

"Of course." Otabek is still smiling as he scratches the back of his neck, thinking. They could have some of the rice plov for lunch tomorrow and maybe finish the soup and the fish tomorrow before it goes bad and still have plenty more food left over. "This will keep us fed until Monday." At the very least.

"Don't forget the family lunch on Saturday. Your cousins and grandma are coming over too. You're bringing your friend, right?"

"Of course." Otabek’s got the date marked in red on the calendar.

"Good. We're making manti. Oh, and you reminded me: I'm also going to make chak chak so you can take some home with you. I baked a cake today and I completely forgot to bring it!"

Otabek's mouth starts watering at the thought. Chak chak is crunchy and light and delicious – and his mother’s recipe calls for it to be slathered with honey. "That sounds great." He can't help himself. Just one sweet treat, he tells himself, he can run a few extra miles to get rid of the calories.

"I'll make a pan just for you," his mother says happily, and Otabek's smile freezes as he tries to guess how much she can fit into a pan. "And some extra manti too. You like it, right? Do you want lamb or horse meat in the filling?"

"Either is fine, mum." Then he remembers about Yuri. "Er. Lamb is better."

"Then I'll make lamb. It's not as heavy, too, so it's good for your diet."

Otabek doubts it will make a difference if she feeds him several plateful, but there's no point arguing. "See you on Saturday, mum. Say hi to the girls for me."

It's not that he doesn't want his mother to cook for him; he just wishes her portions were more manageable. As it is, she sent enough for ten people and Otabek hates the thought of food going to waste. He goes back into the living room, where Yuri is curled on the sofa flicking through one of his music magazines.

Yuri turns his head at Otabek's arrival, craning his neck to grin up at him. "Too much food?"

"I think she's trying to fatten us up." Otabek leans against the table and pulls up his contact list. "I'll ask a couple of friends to come over – there's way more food than we could ever eat on our own."

"Your DJ friends?"

Otabek thumbs through his contacts. "Yeah. Amir also writes original songs. You should ask him to listen to his latest one, it's really good." _Please help_ , he types, _my mother sent food again_.

"What about your latest composition?" Yuri asks. "The one for your free program?"

"You'll hear it when I skate to it at Worlds." It's so difficult to keep it a secret when he's been dying to show his routine to everyone. This year he won't be satisfied with anything but gold.

Yuri pouts. "That's ages away."

Otabek tries to keep a straight face. "Well. If you come to Bomond tomorrow night, I might give you a preview."

His phone is already buzzing with a stream of incoming replies. _Score! I love her cooking_ , and _I'm coming over, I'm starving_.

"What's Bomond?" Yuri asks.

"A club I sometimes play at." He can't keep a grin off his face. "I have a show tomorrow." It was a last-minute arrangement and a stroke of luck – he can't wait to have Yuri listen to his new set list.

Otabek turns around to clear the table while waiting for the others, but he doesn't miss the way Yuri perks up at his words.

"Hell yes! I was hoping you'd say that."

"You only said you wanted to see the club scene a million times." Otabek grins as he moves his textbooks and notes to a shelf. No Partial Differential Equations for the next few days – though he'll have to ask Isabella for help later, he can't make sense of one of the more fiddly proofs. "Where else do you want to go?"

Yuri shrugs. "I haven't had time to google places to see and stuff, figured you'd show me around. Oh, but there's somewhere I want to go – the flea market!"

"Baraholka? Sure, that's always fun. You don't mind crowded places, right?"

Yuri's grin tells him crowds won't be a problem. "I want to get a shirt or something like that as a souvenir."

Otabek nods, half of his concentration on the task of finding enough plates and cutlery and glasses for everyone. "All right. We can walk around the centre and then take the cable car to the top of Kok Tobe hill in the afternoon. It's not a very touristy place but it's got the best view of the entire city."

"Sounds good to me.”

"By the way, my mother invited us for lunch on Saturday. Do you mind going?"

"Of course not, you idiot, why would I mind?" Yuri pauses, chewing on his lower lip. "Won't your family mind that I’m intruding on your celebration? Since it’s Kurban Ait and all that. It’s an important holiday for you, right?"

"You're not intruding. We're not big on the religious significance, for us it's a time to be spent with family and friends."

"All right then," Yuri says, and Otabek draws a breath of relief. His sisters have been pestering him for ages about meeting the famous Yuri Plisetsky – as if Otabek doesn't skate at world level too.

The doorbell rings just then.

"Altin! I'm starving!" someone calls from outside, and then another voice, "Feed us!"

Otabek flashes Yuri an apologetic smile as he goes to open the door. "Sorry, I forgot to warn you – they're quite noisy."

There's a moment as everyone comes in, crowding Otabek's tiny apartment, and introductions are made. Otabek glances between Yuri and the guys. It's the first time his Almaty friends meet one of his skating friends.

"Your mother made plov!" Ruslan exclaims, holding the plate reverently. "I love your mother's plov. I would marry this plov – please give me permission to marry it!"

Otabek snorts. "Give that to me and I'll heat it up."

He stares at the plateful of rice and heads to the kitchen. Suddenly he's not sure this was a good idea. His friends are loud and have a strange sense of humour, and Yuri is so prickly around strangers. He frowns at his reflection in the oven door. What if they don't get along?

When he goes back into the living room, though, everyone’s laughing and talking loudly over each other. Ruslan is setting the table with mismatched cutlery and Amir is sprawled on the couch and gesticulating wildly as he talks with Yuri about music.

"Is this all of the borscht?" Eric calls from the kitchen, his voice muffled as he sticks his head in the fridge. "Man, this is not enough for everyone."

"We ought to tell Mrs Altin that she's letting you starve," Yuri says. Everyone laughs.

"Don't you dare," Otabek says, but he's biting the inside of his cheek to keep himself from smiling.

**Author's Note:**

> This story was inspired by my mum. When my sister moved out, mum would always give her lots of food when she visited. I thought I'd make Mrs Altin a bit more extra, so in the story she goes and fills Otabek's fridge directly. Stories should be a little more exaggerated than reality, right?
> 
> Well, a few months after writing the story I also moved out, and the first time mum came to visit she filled my pantry with canned tuna while I was in the other room. I didn't find out until after she'd left, and when I called her she was like "This way you won't starve! It lasts for months!" and I was grateful, really, but there was _so much tuna you guys_!!
> 
> Thanks for the food, mum.


End file.
